Baton Rouge Reading and Math Service is Requesting Volunteers for Upcoming School Year
Volunteer assisting a child in reading. (Picture courtesy of Kaia Simmons)
Schools are back in person this upcoming school year, which means that the Volunteers In Public Schools (VIPS) is in great need of volunteers to help them after such a challenging year.
Superintendent Sito Narcisse announced that schools in the East Baton Rouge Parish (EBRP) would resume in-person teaching in the Fall. After a year of hybrid learning, students are preparing to return to the classrooms. VIPS wants to help students adjust to the new changes and prepare them for the school year.
VIPS’ mission is to recruit and train individuals and groups to tutor students in the East Baton Rouge Parish school system. The organization does this through its programs Everybody Reads and Everyone Counts. The volunteer services assist elementary school students in their reading abilities and offer math tutoring, creating a positive impact in the community.
The Volunteer and Community Partners Director Kaia S. Simmons said that the organization struggled with challenges during the pandemic that kept them from performing their services.
“Because our programs are designed for in-person one-on-one interaction and relationship building, we lost a lot of volunteers who had difficulty converting to virtual tutoring,” she said.
Simmons also said that VIPS lost significant funding due to not being able to hold annual fundraising events. That is why VIPS seeks individual volunteers and community partners to help assist them.
A volunteer from VIPS helping a student read at his school. (Picture courtesy of Kaia Simmons)
Individuals wanting to volunteer need to be 18 or older, have a love for reading and working with children, must pass a background check and commit at least once a week for an hour to visiting a student at their school.
The organization asks the volunteers to tutor kindergarten to first graders in math in the EveryOne Counts program or PreK to second graders in reading in their Everybody Reads program. Individual volunteers can decide which school they prefer and grade level.
According to the website, teachers recommend tutors to assist up to 1,000 students who struggle in reading and math through the programs. Their data showed that students who received 10 or more tutoring visits through the organization’s services had significantly improved reading test scores.
Simmons said that she understands that some people have discomfort returning back to in-person teaching. However, kids need the support now more than ever before.
“Volunteer recruitment is a constant due to the high need for community support of our EBRP public schools,” she said.
For more information about VIPS, click here. People can sign-up to volunteer for VIPS here. Those who want to donate can help here.