Those who have wandered into Civic House or have thrown even a cursory glance at signs posted on kiosks and bulletin boards know the multitude of volunteer opportunities that are available to Penn students. The programs whose flyers and brochures can be found all over campus offer symbiotic engagement -- you offer your time and goodwill to help develop a community; the community, in turn, welcomes you into a different world that few at Penn experience.
This University does not exist in a vacuum. And those who understand this truism are attempting every day to break down artificial barriers that separate the "elite" Penn from the urban communities that surround it. They hope that active engagement in the community will mitigate some of the socioeconomic problems that by now seem inherent to it. Admittedly, no one program claims to be a panacea. But by tackling the problems from all fronts, change can be achieved.
The Philadelphia public school system is just one of those problematic areas. The insufficient funding that has plagued local public schools is well documented -- and there is little remedy in sight.
Although the problems seem daunting, there is still hope that somehow their effects can be reduced.
The belief is that if each person does his or her part and donates time and effort, there will be a dramatic improvement in the individual students who are otherwise left to the deficiencies of the system. That is where the volunteering programs come into the picture.
In the spring, they hope to organize a day at the Kelly Writers House for Gayle Satchell's 12th grade advanced English class. That would be the symbolic culmination of a year of tutoring for the Penn-Edison-Fereira High School partnership -- of course, the real culmination lies in the kids going off to college.
Both the tutors and the students are excited about the event. "It's amazing that the students gain the comfort level to create and share their work in public," says Jeff Allred, a graduate student in English.
But before the students gather together to celebrate and share their poems, narratives and song lyrics, their talents need to be nurtured.
Every Monday morning for almost two hours, graduates and undergraduates -- most from the English Department -- come to the North Philadelphia high school, which is often referred to as "Philadelphia's Latino high school." Here they share some of their expertise in the field with the ambitious students.
The 12th grade class with which the program is collaborating this year is a "a self-designated college-bound English class," according to third-year tutor and English graduate student Jessica Rosenfeld.
"They are smart kids with parents who care," says Elizabeth Williamson, a program coordinator who is also a graduate student in English. "So we don't have to motivate them."
"We work with the teachers to design lesson plans," Williamson says. "But we also work with individual writing skills." They also conduct debates and have small-group discussions.
And the effort has been paying off. "I have seen improvement in students' writing skills and students' thinking skills," Satchell says. "They are much better able to analyze their literature and respond to it in a more positive way."
But the tutoring curriculum is not strictly academic. The program tries to strike a balance between intellectual and social preparation for college. "Our main goal is to keep them excited about the journey," Rosenfeld says.
The program extends the learning process beyond the Edison schoolyard.
"We bring them onto campus to show them what they can demand from their college experience," Williamson says. The numerous visits to Penn have included overnight stays and performances at the Annenberg Center.
The program dates back to 1990-91, when English professor Al Filreis met a librarian at a Philadelphia public school conference who "ran the library as a kind of oasis or safe haven for creative students." Inspired, Filreis founded the Penn-Edison partnership.
Fourteen years later, the program is still making an impact. However, the tutees are still only high school students who crave not only academic, but social guidance as well.
"They enjoy having us come, but sometimes they can see it as a break or vacation from their normal school," Rosenfeld says. "They want to talk and show you pictures of their friends or talk about the upcoming prom. ... Sometimes it can be difficult to have them focus on the work."
But Rosenfeld herself admits that those distractions are only natural, and says that the real essence of the program can be seen "when a student displays an insight into a poem or a short story ... that reveals something poignant about their lives. ... It is a touching and exciting experience."
The West Philadelphia Tutoring Project organizes programs in 15 schools across the West Philadelphia region. Its influence sweeps from Harrity Elementary School to Sulzberger Middle School to University City High School.
The reach is impressively ambitious.
For more than 300 Penn volunteers, the typical session of tutoring begins with a van ride from Harnwell College House to one of the various schools with which WPTP works.
"We get to the school, and we go into the classroom," says College senior Matt Mormino, the team leader for Sulzberger. "The teacher will be ready with the assignments and the students. Then we go to the library for an hour and work on the assignment."
While the amount of work accomplished in each individual hour may be insignificant, multiply this by the number of WPTP tutors, and all sides agree that the effect on the students is considerable.
"It has been beneficial and effective in our school," says Harrity Elementary School Site Coordinator Tammy Thomas.
It is an "advantage for our fifth grade students who have to take the mandated" Pennsylvania System of School Assessment tests, adds Thomas, noting that it also helps first and second graders who have already fallen behind to catch up before it is too late.
The program embraces its unique one-on-one approach, pairing one tutor to one tutee. This method establishes relationships that oftentimes transcend tutoring. The tutors become "like big brothers and big sisters," Thomas says. And many -- like Thomas and Sulzberger teacher Joanne Shafer -- truly appreciate the individual attention that their students would not receive otherwise.
In his seven semesters of tutoring, Mormino has seen a variety of students -- both those who have benefited from the program and those who have not. "The individual relationship, the progress made and the varying skills change with every tutor and tutee. Each case is different. But I definitely have seen situations where there has been dramatic influence" on the student, Mormino says. "There have been times where the whole multiplication table was memorized over the course of the semester ... and reading levels often improve, too."
However, at UCHS -- where tutors and tutees are not paired off for the semester -- the sessions are not always rife with students. College sophomore Michael Matergia understands that high schoolers often do not want to stay after school for tutoring.
And although Thomas has seen many positive changes in her students, she also sees some room for improvement in the program.
"The only problem that I see sometimes is the communication gap between the Penn tutor and the teacher," she says. Harrity currently uses weekly assignment sheets, but those are sometimes left blank. "It would be beneficial for the tutors to have the opportunity to sit down with the classroom teacher ... . There is not enough time built in for that discussion."
While more time would be desirable, the tutoring visit itself helps clear up misconceptions Penn students have about Philadelphia public school students and vice versa.
"You come in with stereotypes of city schools," Matergia says. "You think it's going to be Dangerous Minds." But by spending time in the schools, these myths are dispelled.
"We tend to think of Philadelphia and Penn as [ranging from] 33rd to 40th streets," College senior Christine Frauenhoffer says. "It is so valuable -- being part of a college in a city -- to experience the whole city, and not just Penn's campus."
Every Thursday after school, about a dozen Shaw Middle School students meet in the girls' cafeteria to work on Da' Bomb -- a hip hop and R&B; magazine. They write editorials and reviews, create contests and find photographs for the publication. This semester, Jason Suggs -- a College freshman and one of the program's coordinators -- hopes that the kids can compile two issues to distribute to their peers.
This is one of the five programs that West Philadelphia Improvement Corps directly runs at Shaw, which is located at 54th Street and Warrington Avenue. WEPIC, which has existed for 16 years, is an umbrella organization that filters and sends volunteers into other programs run by the Center for Community Partnerships. One can find WEPIC volunteers all across West Philadelphia -- at Sayre Middle School, Drew Elementary, University City High School -- but their direct involvement right now is at Shaw.
What sets WEPIC apart is that it allows the kids to explore their own interests under the supervision of college students.
Suggs says that Da' Bomb is a perfect example. "We read and write a lot, but the magazine was created more for their enjoyment."
Some other programs include Girl Talk, a female mentoring group whose topics and agenda are set by the middle school girls themselves; Good Fellas, Girl Talk's male counterpart; and City Lights, a community service dance troupe that is trying to organize a Shaw spring dance show.
All have the same emphasis -- to provide an alternative way to spend the afternoon.
And Shaw's principal, Sharif El-Mekki, thinks this focus is as important as any other.
"It's something [now available] after school for students who are not necessarily engaged. [It is] a continuation of the engagement activities outside of school," he says.
The organizers at WEPIC do not come with prepackaged plans. "They listen to the needs and wants of the students," El-Mekki says. But despite this open-minded approach, the WEPIC program -- which has only begun its collaboration with Shaw this school year -- has had trouble finding students.
Now going into their second semester, the programs are slowly becoming more popular.
Da' Bomb did not produce a magazine last semester because students were inconsistent in attendance. But Suggs recounts the many times that students still tell him that they participated because it is simply more fun to be there to "hang out with friends and college students and talk about music they like," rather than to just go home.
For the past three years, the WEPIC program has been run solely by undergraduate students.
Graphics by Michelle Sloane
