Student Mentoring

Carmen is the little girl that I tutored last year in reading...of course English is her second language, so it was a struggle for this little 3rd grader. She made quite an impression on me and I think I made a difference in her crazy life too. I have a new student this year, Starrla...mousy little petite thing...very cute and quite a funny little attitude but so small for her age...looks like a 5 yr old. The architecture firm I work for designed their school, so we decided to help them out...kind of an inner city location. There are about 3o of us who go every week and spend time with these kiddos. I saw Carmen yesterday...it had been almost a year since I had seen her. She came up and hugged me and we talked about her reading. She said she finished reading the book (Through the Looking Glass) I had given her as a gift to encourage her reading through the summer. She said she finished it and loved it and she was just beaming. It was a tough book for her, so that impressed me. She passed to the 4th grade and I think is doing very well...what a sweet little girl. If anyone is looking for a way to volunteer in your community, I would definately recommend mentoring in the schools. The kids need the attention and gives back to yourself in such interesting ways.