The Center for Community Engagement & Career Competitiveness (CCECC) at Averett University started the Teach It Forward! Challenge (TIF!) in the spring of 2016 as a way to meet an ongoing need for consistent tutors in the Danville community. The CCECC saw an opportunity to meet this need because Averett students identified tutoring as one of the most enjoyable and rewarding volunteer experiences in which they had participated. Thus, TIF! capitalized on students’ interests to build a mutually-beneficial relationship between the campus and the community.
However, since a culture of service was not yet prevalent on Averett’s campus, the CCECC had to get creative; so they added a bit of healthy competition. The CCECC challenged the entire campus, including faculty and staff, to create teams and compete for the most hours tutored over a two month period. Each team was assigned to an after school site, which helped the Averett volunteers build long-lasting relationships with the children they were tutoring. In addition, this was a team effort, which relieved some stress because the volunteers were able to visit their after school sites as it fit into their busy schedule.
Last year, 80 TIF! volunteers provided 585 hours of tutoring at eight different after school sites. This year, we are about halfway through the challenge, so we encourage you to check out what are students are doing by searching #teachitforwardDVA!