Connect Me opens doors for students worldwide through our free online tutoring, but there’s still one door that remains to be opened: reaching families without stable internet access.
As a tutoring nonprofit dedicated to providing free tutoring to all students in need, we rely fully on Zoom meetings to fulfill our mission. Without the internet, however, it’s difficult for us to complete our mission of impacting students worldwide.
Silvana Solsoloy, Connect Me’s Secretary and a long-time member, decided to open a new branch of Connect Me fully designed to address this gap. She launched Connect Me’s first-ever in-person tutoring program over the summer in Fresno, California, by partnering with Woodwark Park, her local library, and Fresno Mission, a local homeless shelter, to expand her impact in the city.
Outside of Connect Me, Silvana signed up as an online tutor under her school, but realized the number of families who were hesitant to proceed because of the fees. “I also recalled previous students who had poor connectivity issues which barred them from attending their sessions,” she recalls.
Currently the founder and president of this program, Silvana oversees all recruitment tasks, hours tracking, and scheduling with the Woodward Park Library.
This program primarily serves families struggling to pay for the paid tutoring program offered by Silvana’s school district, but is also open to families who believe their children in grades K-8 learn best face-to-face.
Since its launch in July, the program has made a significant impact despite its small team of volunteers and leaders. So far, they’ve held over 90 tutoring sessions and actively work to recruit more high school volunteers and local elementary school students. The program is also expanding through partnerships with local nonprofits that work closely with other school districts outside of Clovis Unified School District (CUSD).
This program has future plans to collaborate with Valley Stem Med and Youth Helping Youth, where they will be teaching library classes at underserved schools in Fresno and visiting the Fresno Mission homeless shelter to read books to K-5 children. They are also working to recruit tutors from other school districts to establish the program at other Fresno branches.
While this program is currently based in Fresno, California, Silvana is currently working with other Connect Me chapters to help implement similar in-person tutoring programs near them. She hopes the expansion of her program expands nationwide to all of Connect Me’s chapters to ensure Connect Me’s goal of reaching all students in need of tutoring is achieved.
Author: Diksha Lal
