Middle school mentors take on community projects

I was invited to Virgil Middle School, located on Vermont Avenue near Beverly Boulevard, the other day to talk to Michael Galvan and some of his students about their peer mentoring program.

The program is in its fourth year, and the mentors work with sixth-graders to help them succeed in middle school socially and academically. But they also report graffiti they find in the neighborhood, read to elementary school students and take on other community projects.

Getting organized, the transition to middle school and bullying all come up. But the mentors have expanded the program to include information about eating disorders, alcohol and drugs too.

Galvan sent along some photos of his students at work:

For the mentors, several said they gained confidence, especially in speaking in front of a group.

"It's just part of me to help people," Dulce Vilches, an eighth-grader who is one of the 40 mentors this year, said Thursday. As a sixth-grader, she said she appreciated the help from her own mentor in learning how to be organized and tries to pass that on to the students she mentors now.

Another mentor, Lourdes Ramos, was working on a project -- writing a letter to officials at the Los Angeles Zoo, hoping to persuade them to make some improvements. Across the table, eighth-grader Tony Ramos was reporting graffiti to the city so it could be removed.

Seventh- and eighth-graders who want to choose the mentoring program as their elective fill out an application and get two teacher recommendations. Galvan said one goal of the program is for 85% of the students involved to have no Fs on their report cards. They're a bit shy of that goal -- around 75% last grading period -- but they're optimistic, he said.

-- Mary MacVean

Comments

[Joan Espino]

Cool.. I'm in Peer Mentoring too with Mr. Galvan