ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, May 9, 1996 TAG: 9605100097
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: E12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
SOME children at two elementary schools in the Roanoke Valley are reading better, taking special field trips and planting flower gardens, thanks to Central Fidelity Bank.
The bank is paying for special tutoring for 20 children at Roanoke's Forest Park New American Elementary School and for 15 children at W.E. Cundiff Elementary School in Roanoke County whose test scores indicate they could benefit from extra help.
The two schools are the only ones in the valley among 30 in Virginia chosen for Central Fidelity's Tutors for Success program. The bank gives $4,700 a year to elementary schools to establish programs to help at-risk youngsters improve their grades and test scores. Schools must submit proposals to the bank to be considered for the grants.
Central Fidelity selects 10 new schools each year and finances programs for disadvantaged children for three years. Both Forest Park, a magnet school, and W.E. Cundiff are in the second year of the three-year grant program.
Tammy McGee, the bank's education program coordinator, visited Forest Park recently and presented a $4,700 check to fund its program for next year.
The bank provides money for the tutoring program in both urban and rural schools, McGee said. "Schools have to tell us what they would do with the money and how they would accomplish their goals."
Faye Claytor-Wood, Forest Park's principal, said the school provides the tutoring three afternoons a week. On some days, the children are taken on field trips to the post office, businesses, television stations or other locations.
"It is a career exploration opportunity for them. We like to get them thinking about what they might like to do in life," she said.
Claytor-Wood said the bank gives the school the leeway to provide tutoring in subjects in which the children need help the most. Forest Park teachers have been tutoring the children mainly in reading, writing and arithmetic.
Forest Park also provides seminars for parents of children in the program to help them become more involved in their children's schooling.
At W.E. Cundiff, the tutors program has focused on helping the children improve their reading comprehension. Two teachers and a paraprofessional work with the 15 children in after-school sessions.
Rhonda McDonald, language arts coordinator at W.E. Cundiff, said a unique feature of its program is the use of a video portfolio of student readings. The videos are sent home to parents, who view them and return a response sheet with comments on what they thought of the reading.
McDonald said the children have been taught how to read practical information from the newspaper and magazines. She said the program includes hands-on activities to connect meaning to reading. The children have designed and planted a flower garden around the school entrance sign and installed poles for birdhouses.
McDonald said the children showed an average gain of 25 percent in reading test scores during the first year of the program.
Central Fidelity, which has 15 offices in the Roanoke Valley and 245 offices across Virginia, is also helping to finance another school program in Roanoke. It will contribute $50,000 over the next five years to Partners for Success, a program that provides financial aid, tutoring and other assistance to help disadvantaged youths attend Hollins, Roanoke or Virginia Western Community colleges.
LENGTH: Medium: 75 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: WAYNE DEEL STAFF W.E.Cundiff pupils (from left) Andyby CNBFoster, Ben Chocklett and Morgan Ponton, along with their
classmates, get some instruction on how to be a bank teller from
Martha Brown, supervisor at Central Fidelity Bank in downtown
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