Education United States Project #9270

Provide Free 1-1 Tutoring for Bay Area Students

by Tutorpedia Foundation

Provide Free 1-1 Tutoring for Bay Area Students

Project Report | Sep 18, 2012
Fall 2012 Update: Scholarships, programs & events!

By Diaris Alexander | Operations Manager, Tutorpedia Foundation

Xiomara,12, participating in illustration workshop

Dear Supporters,

Happy Fall! We are officially back in the mode of a fresh new school year and working to better serve our students and build programming! Our Executive Director, Seth Linden, recently returned from his sabbatical and has infused great energy and visionary perspectives here at the Tutorpedia Foundation, as we work to advance our mission of providing a Class of One to every student. Read on for a quick update on our work!

1. Scholarship Application Review

Each year, Tutorpedia Foundation awards year-long tutoring scholarships for low-income students in the Bay Area. We are currently reviewing new applications for the 2012-2013 academic year, and have seen tremendous interest in our scholarships this year! Thank you for your support of this project!

We plan to have the selected scholarship students start working with their individual tutors in October. Our tutors help students with homework, test preparation, study skills, and organizational strategies. Tutors also serve as academic mentors to their students, helping them navigate through the various challenges a student might experience in school and the education system.

2. Spotlight on Sophie Scholars

This summer, we continued our Sophie Scholars program in partnership with Sacred Heart Preparatory for the second year, teaching 24 enriching workshops for promising low-income middle school students from East Palo Alto and Redwood City. These summer classes, paired with personalized one-on-one tutoring during the school year, better prepare the Sophie Scholars for the rigorous college preparatory curriculum that they will face in a few short years. Last year's Sophie Scholars program was so successful that this summer's Sophie Scholars cohort tripled in size!

New student-selected electives included a workshop in web design, beginning guitar, and a children's book illustration course taught in partnership with the renowned global nonprofit Save The Children. Students in the illustration class were featured on KPIX as they prepared drawings and paintings that will be used to help children in the developing world learn to read. This summer, students also delved more deeply into honing foundational academic skills in workshops such as Math Support, Creative Writing, and Solving Hard Problems, in which students grappled with significant dilemmas relevant to their world, and used both critical reading and quantitative analysis skills to derive original solutions. We are very proud of our Sophie Scholars and see a bright future for them!

3. Join us at our 'Welcome Back' Bar Night Fundraiser - October 18th

Mark your calendars to come by Tonic Bar on Polk and Union Thursday, October 18th for a few drinks from 6-9PM! All tips will go directly towards helping us serve Bay Area youth here at the Tutorpedia Foundation.

Who: Tutorpedia Foundation
What: 'Welcome Back' Bar Night Fundraiser
When: Thursday, October 18th, 6-9PM
Where: Tonic Bar - 2360 Polk Street (at Union), San Francisco, CA 94109
Why: To welcome our Executive Director Seth back to the Bay Area and to help us provide high quality, personalized tutoring and related education services to all students, regardless of socioeconomic background

4. Three Easy Ways to Help Advance our Mission

With Gratitude,

Tutorpedia Foundation Team - Seth, David, Diaris, and Emma

Links:

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Jun 20, 2012
See How You've Helped Make an Impact

By Diaris Alexander | Operations Manager, Tutorpedia Foundation

Students using one of our new HP laptops

Dear Supporters,

Thank you for your generous support of the Tutorpedia Foundation! We’re happy to have you as part of our family and the movement to provide high-quality, personalized tutoring and related education services to all students, regardless of socioeconomic background.

It has been an absolute pleasure working with the Tutorpedia Foundation these past few months. It’s hard to believe that four months have already flown by since I joined the team as the Operations Manager. Since February, we have made big strides in our program development and gathered inspiring stories of academic growth and increased confidence in our students. We have several projects in the queue for the summer to build our capacity, increase effectiveness, and complete our strategic plan with the help of our board and nonprofit consulting firm, Third Plateau. Stay tuned and read on for specific updates since our last project report!

1. Generous Donation from HP!

In April, the Tutorpedia Foundation received a generous donation of 9 new laptops from Hewlett Packard! The computers will be loaned to tutors and site coordinators to engage students and utilize multimedia during sessions.

2. Program Update

This academic year we’ve run 9 programs through the Tutorpedia Foundation and served over 100 underprivileged students across the Bay Area. Dr. Amy Morgenstern of Blue Stars Admissions Consulting has also recently begun volunteering her time to provide invaluable college counseling with one of our scholarship students. Thank you, Dr. M!

3. Spotlight on Diana and her Student Gina

Diana D., one of our amazing tutors, shared this session note with us last week demonstrating the tremendous growth of one of her students. To protect the identity of this student, her name has been changed to Gina. Earlier this year, Diana D. began working with Gina, a sophomore in high school with significant literacy challenges. See the heartwarming message Diana D. shares about one of their most recent tutorial sessions, below:

“On Thursday, Gina and I had an incredible session. We worked for the whole time on a workbook designed to improve her study habits. It addressed topics such as organization and note-taking and other study skills. As Gina began to read the workbook out loud, I noticed that her fluency was very good and that she was reading longer words like "confidence" and “organization” without a problem. Each time she read one of these longer words, I found myself catching my breath in surprise. I remarked to her how impressed I was with her reading, and Gina responded with a proud and knowing smile. I told her I wanted to try something out, and wrote down the word "actually" and asked her to read it. She looked at the word and a second later read it correctly. "Actually." I almost burst into tears! I reminded her that during the second session we had together, back in February, she was unable to read this word. "Really?" she said. She looked shocked and very proud. I couldn't help crying a bit from happiness. We gave each other a hug and continued reading. I am so grateful to have been able to watch Gina improve so dramatically over the course of just a few months, and I very much look forward to seeing her for the last time next week. During one of the two hours she will be taking a post-test, and I can't wait to see how she does.”

4. New Video from the 2012 Benefit

Many of you were kind enough to attend or support the Tutorpedia Foundation February fundraiser: For the Love of Education. For those of you who couldn't make it -- or those of you who want to re-live the conversation -- we're excited to share a few highlights from our panel discussion. Check out the video here to listen to renowned education experts Alan Lowenthal, Linda Darling-Hammond, Ninive Calegari,and Kyle Beckham share their views on why it is essential that we find a way to personalize education for every student.

Thanks again for your continued support of our work at the Tutorpedia Foundation. Your generosity and spirit help us further our mission of building a class of one for every student and expanding educational equity among our community of learners. If you are interested in being further engaged with our work, please email us at info@tutorpediafoundation.org. We love to hear from you!

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Mar 28, 2012
Building our community & expanding scholarships!

By Diaris Alexander | Operations Manager, Tutorpedia Foundation

Tutorpedia team at February 15th benefit event

Happy Spring to all of our wonderful supporters!

Since our last project report, we've had several exciting developments here at Tutorpedia, which I’m eager to share with you.

1. I joined the team as the Tutorpedia Foundation's Operations Manager in February. I will be working to expand our ability to serve underprivileged students through our scholarships and other programs. I am genuinely excited, enthralled, and inspired by the team, past accomplishments, and the vision for the future of the Tutorpedia Foundation. We already have a lot of interesting, innovative projects, tools, and services we plan to offer and implement to better serve our students and I am enthusiastic about contributing my ideas, education, and experience to our approach.

2. We graciously welcomed 150 of you for a wonderful evening at For the Love of Education at the 111 Minna Gallery in San Francisco. Our spring fundraiser event featured a lively, inspiring panel discussion about the best ways to personalize education featuring:

Alan Lowenthal, State Senator and Chair of Senate Education Committee
Linda Darling-Hammond, Charles E. Ducommun Professor, Stanford University School of Education
Ninive Calegari, Co-Founder and Executive Director, 826 Valencia,
Kyle Beckham, Teacher, Downtown High School, SFUSD

With your help, we were able to raise over $15,000 surrounding the event, which will help us fund future scholarships for deserving students.

3. Two weeks ago, we participated in KQED's American Graduate event at Laney College in Oakland by tabling and contributing in the education town hall discussion about how to end the dropout crisis in Oakland.

4. Thanks to your donations, we were able to fund half-year scholarships for the remainder of our foundation students this year. All of our applicants are now meeting with their tutors one or more times per week, and are making great progress.

With so much going on at Tutorpedia, we are so grateful to have your support. Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions, comments, ideas, or if you’re wondering about how to get more involved. You can email me directly at diaris[at]tutorpediafoundation.org – I’d love to hear from you!

Sincerely,

Diaris Alexander

Operations Manager, Tutorpedia Foundation

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