National Honor Society members become “Homework Helpers” at Villa Garcia

It’s a quiet Tuesday afternoon in the affordable housing community of Villa Garcia. The complex, just a five-minute drive from MVHS, is a maze of beige barrack-like buildings, making it difficult to find where the action takes place.

But some searching yields a heartwarming find. In the core of the complex is the small but cozy rental office, where a group of young children and MVHS students sits at a table, arms interlocked for a game. Faces break into smiles and laughter as one student after another flounders out of the game, and it takes a minute for it to begin again.

This is Homework Helper, an after-school program that helps kids from low-income families with their homework and teaches them “life lessons.”

National Honor Society co-president senior Chelse Tsai-Simek was volunteering as a Homework Helper last year when she found out that Homework Helper was on the verge of closing down due to lack of funding. After some discussion the club decided to take over and is now in charge of directing various activities for the kids. Usually, the first hour is reserved for homework, while the second hour can consist of activities that range from arts and crafts to dodgeball.

“It’s a really different environment. They’ll have a 4-year-old baby brother or sister [whom] they baby-sit, and they’re only ten years old,” NHS co-president senior Chelse Tsai-Simek said. “[They are] pretty mature kids for their age but also [have] very different outlooks and priorities [from MVHS students].”

Different outlooks and priorities, indeed. Unlike MVHS students, the Villa Garcia children are not growing up with strong academic backgrounds, most likely the result of a considerably poorer school district and incompetent teachers. Many do not consider homework “something you have to do.”

“[I] need to get a different perspective [when I’m a Homework Helper] because these kids are pretty different from [the kinds] of kids that I grew up with, in terms of their learning environment,” NHS co-president senior Pranav Sudesh said. “It’s interesting just teaching them how to get motivated to do their homework and [to] get them interested in school, and that’s one of the more important aspects of it, as opposed to just tutoring them.”

{cc-by-sa}