Tutors, technology benefit Eastern Greene students

The writing center developed by English teacher Lori Vandeventer was inspired by her time at Indiana State University, where she served as a tutor in the ISU writing lab.

"It's been one of my dreams to open a writing center in the high school ever since," Vandeventer told the Eastern Greene School Board on Monday.

The center's staffed every hour, including lunch, by student volunteers who provide feedback on the writing of other students. This year, a dozen tutors are volunteering, all recommended by their teachers.

They've assisted 18 classes and 15 teachers in the first nine weeks of school, and use of the center has grown dramatically over the first two years of operations.

The students aren't paid -- "I occasionally give them chocolate, but that's about it," Vandeventer said, laughing -- but can utilize the experience to better their own writing and eventually obtain work in college writing centers, an experience some have benefited from already, Vandeventer said.

Natalie Rhodes, a second-semester tutor, said her own writing's benefited greatly from the skills she's learned assisting others.

Second-semester tutors must also develop a marketing plan to publicize the center, Vandeventer said.

The center's also intended for use by all students, from the best writers to those facing challenges.

"We want the very best top writers to show up to the writing center as well," Vandeventer said.

The center's not the sole innovation Eastern Greene schools have implemented. Web sites associated with coursework now allow students to turn in assignments, even from their sickbeds, said English teacher Ted Baechtold.

The former banker and stay-at-home-dad has worked, via a shared grant with Monroe County Schools, to implement Web sites -- called "moodles" -- accessible through the school's Web sites via log-ins which allow students to link to course assignments, submit comments, and privately check their own progress or turn in their work.

"(Students) are literally turning in papers from their sick beds."

It's only one aspect of several new Internet-based programs which, through the construction of a new high school, have brought students greater preparedness for an increasingly technology-savvy word, Baechtold said.

Next year, the school plans a teleconference, held through the Internet, which will allow Baechtold's son to establish an on-site link at Auschwitz to allow Eastern Greene students the chance to converse with German schoolchildren on the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the former concentration camp.

"Things that could only be done in the highest levels of corporate boardrooms can now be done in our public schools," Ted Baechtold said. "I've been told there is also a lot more (grant) money out there to do things like this."