Neighborhood Tutoring

By Steve Shooman

Gowanus In Unity Tutoring Program’s basic goal is to give students individualized help with their schoolwork using volunteer tutors from the community. We feel that the one-on-one environment allows the tutor to get to know the student, and the student’s academic needs.

Other objectives are to:

• Provide a structure in which students can learn the importance of promptness, appointment responsibility, calendar management, and respect for their tutor’s time.
• Bring the ethics and work habits of the adult workplace into the consciousness of the student.
• Expand the range of societal values to which a student is exposed.
• Coordinate and supplement the help they already receive at school and at home.
• Reduce the sense of isolation that some residents of public housing have about the residents of the surrounding "brownstone neighborhoods".
• Reduce the discomforting misconceptions that some residents of surrounding neighborhoods feel about nearby public housing residents.
• MOST IMPORTANT: Students and tutors learn from each other.

The Boerum Hill Association and the Gowanus Community Center in conjunction with Gowanus Houses of the New York City Housing Authority sponsor the tutoring program.

Details: There are approximately 30 tutors and students in the program at any given time. The students are mainly residents of Gowanus Houses who learn of the opportunity by word of mouth, and announcements at meetings. However, any student of any age in Brooklyn is welcome. After filling out an application, the student needs are identified.

Each new volunteer tutor is interviewed to determine his or her areas of academic strength and interest. The Tutoring Coordinator, Steven Shooman, then matches the strengths, motivations, and availability of the potential tutors with the needs and personalities of the students who have applied. Each tutor is matched with one student. An initial meeting is scheduled for the tutor, the student, the Tutoring Coordinator and the parent/guardian to make introductions, exchange telephone numbers, create a schedule, and review procedures. The tutor and the student decide on time, duration, and frequency of sessions. Most tutors meet their students once a week, with sessions lasting one hour. The Community Center is open and supervised from 3 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. on school days and is located at 420 Baltic Street, between Bond Street and Hoyt Street, on the South side of the street behind the flagpole. Students and tutors sign in at the entrance to the Community Center and sign a tutoring logbook each time they meet. Students and tutors may ask for help from the Tutoring Coordinator or the Community Center staff if there are any problems while tutoring. The Tutoring Coordinator looks for erratic attendance patterns, or other problems, and will attempt to resolve them. The tutor, student, and parent/guardian are encouraged to contact the Tutoring Coordinator if they have any problems or concerns they cannot resolve.

Meetings for all tutors and meetings for all tutors, students and parents may be held on occasion. A procedure exists for the tutor to join with the parent and student to communicate with the student's teacher when special issues need to be addressed.

The tutoring program culminates near the end of the school year with a closing ceremony.

Skills: Tutors must like to work with children and have basic skills in school subjects. Most students are generally between the ages of 8 and 17. Little preparation is necessary because it is the student's responsibility to bring schoolwork or other material in which help is needed. However, after getting acquainted, the tutor often supplements and tailors the materials. Alternative material, mainly involving reading, writing and spelling skills are available to the tutor in the tutoring library at the center.

You can contact me directly as follows if you are interested, or have any questions about tutoring. If you cannot tutor but would like to donate used computers, cash, etc. that is also appreciated.

Steven Shooman (Tutoring Coordinator)
718-522-5746