Tutoring Project among students
The Tutoring Project of the Integrated Center for Youth and Adult Education (Cieja) Campo Limpo, in São Paulo, Brazil, is a moment for the guidance of students, fostering a critical and reflective sense of the context in which they live, in order to also be agents of school transformation and the community where they live. Each teacher is the “tutor” of a group, in which discussions and reflections take place.
Cieja Campo Limpo is made up of students of different ages, as it is an education school for young people and adults. Many of them have family, personal problems or the social context that surrounds the school, such as violence or conditions of vulnerability. As the school's need to know its students better is often compromised due to the daily dynamics, for four years the pedagogical coordination studied how to develop a moment destined exclusively for the recognition and approximation of the teaching staff with the student body.
Based on the demands raised through the individual reflection of each participant, the group of students and teachers searches for possible partners to deepen the issues raised. The partner can offer an orientation class or a service, for example. Tutoring takes place weekly and each student stays with the same tutor for a year, in order to further strengthen bonds of trust. Most of the faculty is involved with the proposal and the professor always assumes this role as a workload.
The Tutoring Project is held every week at all shifts at Cieja. Each teacher is the “tutor” of a group, in which discussions and reflections take place. The tutorial lasts approximately an hour and a half. This project directly mobilizes the community, since the observation of the space takes place from the students, who are also residents of the neighborhood. All educators are responsible, but also the employees/collaborators of the space, showing that everyone is also educators. In some cases, due to interest or profile, employees took on the role of mentoring.