Students Waiting for Your Help

Rhode Island students who need your help right now to reach their literacy goals:

Adriana

Mackayla

Adonys

Adriana

Adriana and her twin sister, Mackayla, have been receiving tutoring from RITES for the past two years, but their parents struggle to pay for services.  They now need different levels of support and cannot receive tutoring at the same time anymore, to cut costs.  Adriana is now in the 5^th grade with literacy skills at about the beginning of 2^nd grade.

In 2018 and 2019, she spent five intensive weeks with us in our Code Breakers class, where she made significant progress – here is the power of RITES for Adriana:

Even with this all-important intervention and progress, Adriana’s reading and writing skills are now equivalent to the beginning of 2^nd grade (3 grade levels below expectations). Adriana is a motivated, hard worker, and our intensive instruction with her is making a difference. Now more than ever, she needs to keep up the skill-building we’ve started.

Please consider supporting Adriana with a generous donation to the RITES financial assistance program. Together, we can build this little girl’s self-confidence back up and give her the gift and power of literacy.

CHOOSE how much you can help Adriana:

Mackayla

Mackayla is Adriana’s twin sister. They may look alike, but their academic needs are at different levels.

When we met these girls, their literacy profiles were similar enough to be able to instruct them together to create a group tutorial and save their hard-working parents money while they waited for financial support.  The girls were also able to participate in our partially-funded, small-group summer program in 2018 and 2019. This past summer, the girls were placed in different sections of the summer program, because Mackayla’s literacy skills were a little ahead of Adriana’s.

Now, Mackayla needs to continue intensive literacy intervention to strengthen skills, such as transferring learned concepts to new words and situations, and to close the achievement gap.  Even with consistent intervention, Mackayla’s literacy skills are currently at about a beginning/mid 2^nd grade level. With your support, we can help Mackayla (and others like her) reach her goal of literacy.

2019 summer progress for Mackayla:

CHOOSE how much you can help Mackayla:

Could you help both Adriana and Mackayla? $3,000 covers 50 individual lessons. Please consider a donation that would let these twin girls continue to receive crucial RITES instruction equally:

DONATE TODAY

Adonys

Adonys is a young adult, who recognized it’s never too late to claim his right to literacy.

It took a lot for him to gather the courage to leave the house and begin tutoring with RITES teacher, Deborah Phillips (pictured here, working on their Wilson reading and spelling lesson).

While he receives some financial assistance from RITES, that money will run out well before Adonys meets his goal of being able to read at a level that could lead to job opportunities. Here is how RITES has helped, in his own words:

My reading has improved since I started at RITES in May of 2018. Since graduating from High School in 2013, I have been at home most of the time. I was shy, and uncomfortable with new people. I am happy to come to tutoring because my reading is improving. I used to play video games but was not able to read the words. Now I can do that. I don’t get lost anymore, because I can read what it says. I feel comfortable with my tutor, Deb. I hope to go to a trade school, so I can get a job that I like.

Adonys has made real progress. Here is what his RITES teacher, Deborah, had to say:

What is interesting is his desire to learn the meanings of words. Ex: the word was “prevent.” I explained that pre- can be a prefix and gave its meaning.  He thought for a minute and asked, “ Is that like ‘preview’?”  He does this all the time now, making connections.  Adonys has gained so much self-confidence, as well. He has a sense of humor that is really pretty funny and clever. It really is a pleasure working with him and seeing him grow as a person, as well as a reader. 

But, that all comes to an end, unless you help keep the momentum going. 

Adonys has a ways to go before he has the mastery he needs to achieve his aspirations. He comes to the learning center twice a week so that he can learn faster and more effectively. Soon, his funding will run out. We can’t continue to provide the necessary tutoring for Adonys until we have the funds to do so. $3,000 will provide 50 lessons’ worth of tutoring for this vulnerable, motivated, young man. Please don’t let him experience a gap in instruction, lose momentum, and fall through the cracks into failure.

CHOOSE how much you can help Adonys: