Luke in Action

Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all people.

Luke 2:52

It's from this Luke passage that our after-school program (as debuted in our now home community of Woodlawn) has taken its name and, more importantly, its vision. Our goal is to equip and to empower a group of 25 second through fifth grade students with the necessary tools to thrive spiritually, intellectually, socially, and physically within their various home and school environments. Our vision, subsequently, is to grow a Christ-centered, holistic after-school program which truly serves its urban youth in multiple ways. We see strength in pouring time and energy into a few; frankly put, to us it's about the depth and quality of our after-hours teaching is of more importance than the number of students. Right now, all 25 spots are filled and we have a growing waiting list!

Club 2-5-2 follows the public school calendar and runs Tuesday through Thursday. College students (most of which come to us from Moody Bible Institute), local high school students, and neighborhood moms teach, interact, and converse with our students together, helping to advance students' reading, writing, math, and computer learning skills. Witnessing the ease with which these three group of volunteers work alongside one another is a real joy for us to see young and old, black and white, working alongside each other, serving the young people.

Furthermore, there are moments like these...

* Sunshine officially opens its doors for tutoring at 3:30 p.m., but students have been showing up 15 to 20 minutes early eager and ready to learn! We appreciate their eagerness and as the minute our volunteers arrive the work begins.

* Two of our students - Mariah Harper (third grade) and Terrance Mills (fifth grade) - received their school's Student of the Week award based upon their excellent academic performance and citizenship.

* When you ask these grammar school students to describe their tutoring program, they they will reply with, "it's a college preparation program!" Praise God.

* One segment of our teaching is dedicated to teaching about the lives of "world changers" throughout time. We (the leadership) tell the students that they, too, are scholars and world changers. One day we had a discussion about what a world changer is, and about who some world changers have been. Students named people like Martin Luther King Jr., Moses, and Rosa Parks. A few days later, as Dave Clark was reviewing with them the explanation of a world changer, one of our students named Alexis responded with, "I am." That's exactly right! Best answer we've received so far.

It's moments like these, when we know the students are engaging with and enjoying their learning experience, that make tutoring an enjoyment for us as well.