MIT Calculus for America partnership
This year, we started a new partnership with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) called MIT4America Calculus project.
This is a new initiative from MIT that began this year in order to help students master a course that is often considered the ‘golden ticket’ on college applications and a gateway to future STEM studies. It is also a way for MIT to increase their outreach efforts and spread their Calculus knowledge around the country, especially to students who might not have access to Calculus at their school. The program has done very well in its first year: article HERE (website) and HERE (PDF).
I first heard about it in November when my former AP Calculus student and current MIT student reached out to me to see if I wanted to add my AP Calculus BC classes to their tutoring program. I immediately said yes, as the program offers unlimited free tutoring to current high school Calculus students. The tutors are predominantly current MIT students with some alumni as well. All tutors are trained by MIT, are then paired with a high school, and then meet virtually with the high school teacher before tutoring begins in order to get acquainted and discuss expectations. The tutoring sessions can happen during school, right after school during extra-help time, or even in the evenings after sports and activities, so long as the student’s parents/guardians fill out a waiver form and are CC’d on all email communications.
I tried to get a handful of my students who would have benefitted the most from this set up with the evening tutoring, but unfortunately that never happened. This was mainly due to lack of interest on the students’ part or delays in getting the parent/guardian forms filled out. The after school extra help sessions, though, from 1:50 - 3 were extremely helpful and beneficial. During December, my former student and current MIT tutor actually came into my classroom after school three days a week to work with my students, which was truly a blessing because that happened to be a very busy month with test corrections and extra help before holiday break, so my room was full of students each day. Having her there was like having a duplicate of myself and eliminated the need for a long line of students waiting to ask me questions or meet with me.
In January, tutoring continued but remotely, and I also got 3 more tutors that were available on different days. In order to prevent the tutoring sessions from being too large (MIT requested 1-3 students per tutor), I had to make a Google Sheet sign-up sheet for each day of January that I was staying after. It was first-come first-serve, so my students put there name in a time-slot that worked for their schedule. January was also busy after-school, mainly due to the challenging content we were working on (advanced methods of integration and applications of integration) and the fact that my seniors were still fully focused. They had not begun slacking off as the end of the year approached, college acceptances rolled in, Spring sports kicked in, and beautiful Spring weather beckoned them outside rather than staying after school for school work.
My students each had their tutors that they preferred the most, but I found all of the tutors to be knowledgeable and committed. I am in the process of continuing this partnership next year as well and am meeting with the project lead this week. This program really is so great and you cannot beat free, personalCalculus tutoring!
A week ago, I received a thank you package in the mail from MIT which was so thoughtful and kind. It was a card signed by all the tutors and the program lead, chocolates, mints, and chapstick with MIT’s PK-12 Initiative logo.
I’m excited to see where this goes next year, and I will have the benefit of being able to introduce this opportunity to my students on Day 1, rather than close to halfway through the year. I had many students not realizing that they could take advantage of this tutoring ANY day and at ANY time, so now I know I need to promote it even more than I already did.