Editor's note: This story is part of Southwest Michigan Second Wave's On the Ground Battle Creek series. This is an updated version of a story originally published in Second Wave on June 23, 2022.

Thelma Vaughn is looking for reading tutors to meet the growing demand she is seeing from elementary school students who would benefit from someone who could both teach and listen.

On Sept. 20 Vaughn, a retired teacher with the Battle Creek Public Schools, began the 19th year of a reading program that she started in 2003 at her home church, Second Missionary Baptist. This year she started with 11 students in grades 1-5 and already has a waiting list of more than six students.

Currently, two students work with one volunteer tutor.

“I would prefer to have one-on-one tutoring,” Vaughn says. “The more tutors we get, the more students we can actually work with. If we get too many students and not enough tutors, it actually diminishes the work we’re trying to do.”

Deboraha Sallee, left, works with Kora Spicer, 8, at Second Missionary Baptist’s after- school tutoring program.Vaughn who has been retired from teaching for 31 years began the reading program after sensing that the needs she saw as a teacher remained. Her reading program focuses on providing additional support with reading skills and comprehension for the Battle Creek school district’s first through fifth-grade students.
 
“It always seemed to me while I was working that there was a missing piece to the puzzle to helping kids be successful in school and life and that was that at-home practice,” she says. “In school, they work on vocabulary and decoding words and reading stories. But they needed to have someone to read to. A lot of students when they left school for the day went home and mom and dad were either working or otherwise occupied. This was not 'Leave it to Beaver'. There was no one waiting for them with milk and cookies. I thought it would be a wonderful situation if after school we had a comfortable and laid-back scenario where kids could start reading.”
 
At the same time, the pastor of Second Missionary wanted to have some type of afterschool program in the building for kids. He and a woman who had started a similar reading program in Seattle before moving back to Battle Creek wrote a grant to the W.K. Kellogg Foundation which awarded them $25,000 for the “We Read” program.
 
“At that time, we had students coming from eight different elementary schools, including Washington Elementary, which was across the street from the church,” Vaughn says. 
 
Students from Washington Elementary could walk to the program and the church also had a van to pick up students from the other schools.
 
Once at the church, students are greeted by volunteers who offer them a snack and a few minutes to talk about their day before diving into vocabulary and skills work, homework and reading. This is a routine that is strictly adhered to because “students operate better when they know what to expect,” Vaugh says. The 90 minutes they spend in this program at the church gives them the opportunity to read to someone or be read to.
 
Roxie Perry, right, works wih Ryan Thompson, 10, at Second Missionary Baptist’s after- school tutoring program.“With a lot of the students we run into there isn’t anyone to do that when they get home. The connections they make are almost as valuable as the skills that they get,” Vaughn says. “They’ve been in a classroom all day with 30 or 40 other kids all vying for the teacher’s attention. The ones that are really trying to learn or are really quiet aren’t the ones the teacher is focusing on. I can say this from experience. To know when you leave school you can go to a reading program and Miss So and So is going to be waiting just for you, it makes them feel special.”
 
Pre-COVID, the program which operates from September through May annually, was serving 25 students Tuesday through Thursday with a team of about 40 volunteers who would come in on either of those three days.  When the program started up again in 2021, there were fewer volunteers which impacted the ability to serve more students.
 
“There was a big gap and coming back. Many of the tutors were veterans and had been with us for years, but they did not feel comfortable coming back from COVID,” Vaughn says.

At that time, she was operating the program with a skeleton crew of 14 tutors that included her and an assistant.

“There’s a demand for these services because with COVID there was an awareness that there were a lot of students who had fallen behind in their reading,” she says.

Xavier Thompson, left, a 10th grade student at Battle Creek Central High School, works with Anthony Bridges, 8, at Second Missionary Baptist’s after-school tutoring program.However, her primary motivation even before COVID was that she wanted to provide a place where students could practice what they were being taught in the classroom on weekdays after school.
 
Despite COVID and the fluctuating numbers in tutors throughout the history of the program, Vaughn says she has been able to find the $25,000 it takes annually to run the program. 
 
“Down through the years funding has come from the Battle Creek Community Foundation, the Miller Foundation, the United Way, and the WKKF,” she says. “There were years when we started the program and didn’t know if we had the funding or not. We would just plan to do it even if we didn’t know if we would have funding. But we’ve also managed to find the funds. God has been good.”
 
The initial grant “We Read” got from the WKKF back in 2003, provided funds to purchase books for the program. Vaughn says different organizations and retired teachers also have donated books.
 
Thelma Vaughn is the coordinator Second Missionary Baptist’s reading program which runs diuring the school year.The biggest need now is finding volunteers willing to read or be read to, Vaughn says.
 
“What is really at the core of what we need is people who are interested in helping kids. You don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar and we only ask for 90 minutes of your time each week,” she says. “You just have to show up with listening ears and a little patience.”

Anyone interested in volunteering should call the church at (269) 963-4640.
 
“Everything in our society is written whether it be on a computer or a phone,” Vaughn says. “Helping students learn how to read is vital because at this point if an individual doesn’t have that skill of being able to read, understand and comprehend it’s like a person navigating the world blind. This program gives students an opportunity for an almost one-on-one connection for three days a week. A lot of our families are under so much stress now trying to make ends meet and staying off the phone long enough to talk to those they live with. Our time with them gives them opportunities they might not otherwise have.”