MATCHing Charter Tutors With District Students
The Charter Advocate
Spring, 2007
By Massachusetts Charter Public School Association
It's not unusual for young 20-somethings to be unsure of their career plans when they graduate from college. Julie Ann Clark decided to tutor while she figured it out and students at Boston English High School are glad she did.
Clark, a 22-year-old Boston University graduate, spends parts of Tuesdays and Thursdays at Boston English in Jamaica Plain, as a geometry tutor with the MATCH Corps, a one-year fellowship program run by the Media and Technology Charter Public High School (MATCH) in Boston and Americorps. The reaction she's received from her students has opened her eyes to how badly many struggling students want to succeed.
"There was one particular girl who was staying after school and I was helping her and she was really excited about finally understanding this thing that had been very confusing to her," says Clark. "Then she said 'This is so great. This is what I need. I wish I had a tutor all the time.' I felt bad because it made me wish I could give her more time. But it also made me proud of what I'm doing and happy I'm there."
The MATCH Corps recruits 25 recent college graduates from top universities across the country to commit to a year of public service, tutoring primarily mathematics, English, SAT preparation and college essay prep. They receive a small salary and live in a dorm on the top floor of the MATCH School. Expenses are covered by Americorps and MATCH donors. MATCH tutors currently teach in both Boston English and Brighton High School. The district schools are not charged for the tutors.
"The genesis of this collaboration was our commitment with Americorps to serve more students of Boston with powerful, personalized tutoring," says Alan Safran, executive director of MATCH.
Though the young graduates are trained at MATCH to be tutors, the MATCH program doesn't exclusively recruit education majors. Rather it enlists individuals with varied interests and skills, drawing from colleges such as Harvard, Stanford, Texas, UMass, Boston College and Dartmouth, to name a few.
"One of the great assets of the program is that all the tutors are from different backgrounds," says Clark. "We have art history majors, philosophy majors, I was an international relations major."
Clark says the students at Boston English are very appreciative of the tutoring they receive, because it's not always available to them.
"At MATCH every kid expects a one-on-one tutor all the time because it's part of the program," she says. "But that's not the case at other Boston public schools. So the kids at English are really, really grateful for us taking the extra time to help them with things they don't understand. I've just been really impressed by the kids there."
And while the career plan she ultimately creates may not include becoming a teacher, Clark says she's enjoyed her time with MATCH Corps and her involvement with Boston's public schools.
"If anything, no matter what I do in the future," she says, "I'll have this perspective and awareness of education in America. There's a lot to be done."
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