We encourage all tutors new and experienced to attend our orientation and resource meeting. We will share resources available for tutors, listen to your ideas, answer questions, and make sure we know why we tutor. We will meet in the Solid Rock Cafe'. Staff will be in the Cafe' at 5:00 PM giving us an opportunity to gather early for questions and getting re-aquatinted. So come early if you would like, though the meeting will begin at 6:20.
Initially I would say that I was answering a call from God, “continually give yourself full to the works or the Lord” (1Co. 15:58), and seeking eternal rewards from God for such efforts. But what I was not expecting was to receive such a blessing and joy from helping the younger children at tutoring. Anyone who enters into a missionary endeavor seem to return with a report of receiving more than they gave, and this is how I feel after an evening of tutoring. As tutors we share in three areas, 1) Academic, 2)Evangelistic, and 3) Fellowship. We work on homework and try to help children where they have need or simply encourage them in their work. The evening begins with a couple of praise songs and a short message from the Word, which we may use to share our faith with the kids. Then there is a time at the end of the evening where we can play games, get a snack, and be a bit more casual. Take my word for it… ”It’s a blessing.” Try it and see if this is what God would have you d. It just might be a place where you fit in.
The one who spends the most time with them wins. A deeper relationship can make a tremendous difference in the lives of children in the inner city. Our children for the most part come from homes with little to no experience in higher education, and often little to no understanding of the difference that education may make in a child's future. Only 3% of the households in southwest Detroit
have someone with a Bachelor's degree.
Christian character and faith remain a rarity among the urban poor. So simply coming and spending time with a child in the city may communicate a faith and experience that otherwise may be totally foreign to them. Or we may find ourselves lending needed support to a child of a believing parent. However it works, Christ's presence through us is needed.
Monday evenings we open our doors at 5:30 and the kids start coming. Children come and check in. If they do not have homework we go through our resource files and give them work appropriate for their needs. By 6:00 pm tutors begin showing up and join their students in the sanctuary. At 6:20 we sing a couple songs and hear a short homily. Then we go to one of the forty tutoring stations and work. At 7:30 we finish with a snack and a half hour of recreation.
Weather related cancelations
When DPS (Detroit Public Schools) cancels school because of weather on a Monday our tutoring program will be canceled for that evening.
This fall we began with a record number of students and a great need for tutors. On our second week of tutoring we had 88 students and 51 tutors. Pleas prayerfully consider joining us in making a difference through tutoring a student in Detroit.
This year we opened our Solid Rock Cafe' as a part of our outreach to our community. One way we are using the cafe is to give our children in tutoring an incentive to do well by bringing homework and regularly attending tutoring. Students who do well receive tickets that they can redeem at the cafe to buy game time and snacks like pizza and pop. Tutors fill out a small report card measuring the performance of their student over a three week period - then the kids receive their tickets and the fun begins. The cafe is open on Mondays and Tuesdays from 3 to 8 PM, on Fridays from 3 to 10 PM, and on Saturdays from noon to 8 Pm.