INDIANAPOLIS — A woman and a girl are at the table when Mike Wilkins walks in.
The girl holds up a piece of notebook paper. It bears a column of words she has written, one almost as long as her braids.
Wilkins says he sees how much she’s improved in forming the letters. The kindergartner beams.
Leaving the room, he looks out a window where a man and boy are gathered over a lesson in the back yard. Wilkins knows how much the young man prefers to be outdoors. So does the tutor.
“He’ll get more out of him sitting there in the sun,” Wilkins says.
The tutor-student pairs are in this room and that, next to shelves of children’s books or a couple of desks, reading and writing and forging relationships.
It happens four days a week in a rented house just a few blocks away from Charles Warren Fairbanks School 105, part of the Indianapolis Public Schools district.
Renewal Neighborhood Ministry sends a van to the school at dismissal on Mondays through Thursdays. School staff know that van and help it quickly navigate the car line to carry students to the Renewal house for after-school tutoring.
About 25 students participate in the Renewal Scholars program, most of them meeting with a tutor twice a week. Organizers work to ensure a child meets with the same one or two tutors each week.
Volunteers have been tutoring students at the Fairbanks school for several years. They used to offer some after-school group tutoring at the school with a curriculum, but they later found it more effective to embrace a one-on-one tutoring structure.
“These kids really need one-on-one attention,” Wilkins said. “They just thrive in a one-on-one environment.”
The transition happened before the 2020 coronavirus quarantine, when schools shifted to virtual instruction in spring 2020. During that time, Renewal volunteers sought to offer help to students navigating virtual lessons. A new facet of the tutors’ work since then has been ensuring a student remains on pace with schoolwork.
Generally, though, this is their approach: If there’s an academic skill that’s a struggle, the tutor will work to bring a child to grade level. If there’s an area in which a child is academically gifted, the tutor seeks to “fan that flame a little,” Wilkins said, such as picking a more challenging library book and encouraging the child to read it.
Most Renewal Scholars come right after school, but on Tuesdays and Wednesdays a smaller group of scholars arrive for a 5:30 p.m. session.
On a recent Tuesday between sessions, volunteer John Zoller hugs his student heading out the door. “Give your best to you mom,” Zoller says.
Zoller went on a work trip with fellow members of Outlook Christian Church a few years ago. They painted the exterior of an older woman’s home in West Virginia’s coal country. It was a good experience, but it made him think about ways he could be of service through the year, close to home.
“Once I met the kids, I was hooked,” he said. “It’s amazing when Jesus Christ touches your heart and leads you down a new path that you never thought you’d be on.”
Al Stadlberger’s path to tutoring also included a mission trip, one to Haiti that he says changed him forever. Afterward, “I just wanted to give back,” he said.
His wife, Jana Stadlberger, also tutors and has become administration director for Renewal.
“When you see a breakthrough with a child you’re tutoring, your heart just swells,” she said. “When kids come into the house and they hug you, how could you pass that up?
Renewal Neighborhood Ministry was formed several years ago by people from Crossroads Bible Church, north of the Fairbanks elementary school, and Outlook Christian Church in McCordsville.
Even before they made it official, volunteers had been engaged with the school and the neighborhood. Based on input from school staff, they offered a summer reading club for younger students. They listened to parents who wanted organized activities for their children and launched flag football and soccer leagues; a spring soccer season starts next week.
The volunteers sought neighbors’ input by visiting and conducting a survey. Before one such survey, Wilkins was placing a couple of signs and some door hangers about the upcoming visit so residents would know what was going on and feel more comfortable offering their thoughts.
As he anchored one sign, Wilkins met the owner of some apartments there. He was curious and had a long talk with Wilkins about the neighborhood.
From him, Renewal came to rent the house where its office and the tutoring are located. The landlord became a tutor himself.
Renewal has some cookouts and worship music nights in the yard and plans to plant a church there in 2022. Wilkins, missions and outreach minister at Outlook and president of Renewal’s board, will be pastor of the new church.
Wilkins said some of the children who come for tutoring think Wilkins lives in the house. He points out none of the rooms is furnished as a bedroom.
From outdoors, however, it might be easy to think Wilkins does live there. He plants tomatoes, peppers, beans or peas, herbs and marigolds in a garden out back. Some Master Gardeners visited recently and helped the children plant flower seeds.
The front yard has been fenced, and Wilkins planted flower bulbs. He wants people to find Renewal a good neighbor.
The tutors have seen their work come full circle. One young woman, tutored four years ago as a fifth-grader, is now a high school freshman thinking about college. She has come back to serve as a tutor and has forged a strong bond with her student.
“They LOVE each other,” Wilkins said. “It’s been a fun thing to watch.”
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Renewal Neighborhood Ministry serves families living in the neighborhoods near Post Road and 42nd Street in Indianapolis. It organizes after-school tutoring, sports leagues, a Christmas store and other events.
The ministry picks up children after school to take them to the house for tutoring. It’s been using a borrowed van but will lose access soon and is looking for its own 12- or 15- passenger van.
The ministry could also use a donation of 12-15 identical, functional laptops. The ones in use how have three different operating systems.
Juice boxes and individual-size snacks would also be helpful at the tutoring house.
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