VOLUNTEER TO BECOME A READING TUTOR
AARP Experience Corps matches volunteer tutors ages 50 years and older with non-fluent readers in grades K-3. By pairing young learners with experienced readers, we help to build confidence and trust at a critical time for children.
Experience Corps helps older adult volunteers put their wisdom to work, while, at the same time, addressing a major contributor to poverty: the inability of children to read at grade level by the end of third grade.
There is no experience necessary to become an Experience Corps Bay Area tutor. We provide volunteer training and continuing support. Our volunteer community comes from all over the Bay Area and beyond; most are ages 65-85 years old and have a variety of work backgrounds. We do not require Experience Corps Bay Area volunteers to be residents of, or otherwise affiliated with, Sequoia Living.
Launched in a single school in 2007, Experience Corps Bay Area now serves thousands of students throughout Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Sonoma counties.
2023 HYBRID MODEL: IN-PERSON AND ONLINE LITERACY TRAINING
In 2020, when the pandemic began, we promptly took action by initiating online reading tutoring for our volunteers. As soon as it was safe to resume in-person tutoring, we opted to maintain both options: in person and online. This hybrid approach enables us to cater to all older adults who desire to utilize their skills and spread the joy of reading, assisting young students in grades 1-3 to develop confidence and fluency in reading.
HOW WE MEASURE PROGRESS
Results from multiple independent evaluations prove that Experience Corps leads to significant reading gains for students who have struggled. Thanks to our volunteers who use this opportunity to rediscover purpose in their lives, the children in our program become great readers giving them an advantage to escape the cycle of poverty.
Experience Corps conducts an annual and ongoing data collection and reporting to measure student progress. Standardized assessments are used to determine a student’s reading proficiency upon entry into the program, and are administered multiple times per year, with at least one mid-point and final assessment. An Experience Corps staff person is designated to collect and analyze the standardized assessment data.
STUDENT ELIGIBILITY
Students in our program are often a half to a full year and a half behind in reading; however, we like to work with our schools to decide which students will benefit the most. If you are with a school in the Bay Area and want to find out how to bring Experience Corps to your students, please contact Sandi Strang, Director of Experience Corps Bay Area at SStrang@sequoialiving.org or call (415) 464-1767.
Thank You!
