“I feel we have a social responsibility to give back to the community when we get the chance to. That is one of the many reasons I volunteer.”
One Wednesday morning at Florence Elementary school, a man with a volunteer sticker stood in the hallway waiting to pass by as lines and lines of students are passing between classes.
The man starts high-fiving each student that rushes by. He laughs as some students jump to reach his hand or just give him a shy grin, avoiding the high-five. You can tell even a small interaction like this brightened both the students and the man’s day.
This man is Jeff Smith, a retired dentist who now is a One-to-One reading coach at Florence Elementary School.
The One to One coaching program is a project of the Northern Kentucky Education Council which trains volunteer coaches and works with local schools to place them with students who need a little extra help.
Jeff has always enjoyed working with children whether it was showing them how he could wiggle his ears in the dental office to lighten the mood or coaching different basketball, football, and soccer teams.
“When I was a dentist working in my office I loved working with kids. I loved making their experience more enjoyable”, Jeff said.
After retiring from his dental practice, Jeff learned about a volunteer opportunity from the Northern Kentucky Education Council to work one-on-one with local elementary school students focusing on reading. Since Jeff has always enjoyed reading and working with children, he saw this as a fitting opportunity. He has been a One-to-One coach ever since he saw that ad about 8 years ago.
Jeff primarily works with 2nd-3rd grade students who are a little behind in their classroom reading programs. In the past he was assigned one student a year, but in the last two years he has started to work with two students a year.
Jeff Smith and his friend Tony
Jeff is normally assigned male students, but he shared he has been paired with a couple female students as well. The first female student Jeff coached taught him about books he had never heard of before such as Pinkalicious and Fancy Nancy, which was a unique experience for him to say the least.
He works with the students once a week for 35-45 minutes, reading different books and creating journals about the books they have read. Jeff has the students rate each book from 1-5 stars and answer a few questions about each story. He lets the students know it is okay to not give every story 5 stars; he values their opinions and wants to let them know they can have different opinions on the books he chooses for them to read.
When asked about his favorite part of volunteering, Jeff began to tell me a story about a 3rd grade boy he currently coaches named Tony. Normally Jeff only works with the same student for a year, but this is Jeff’s second year with Tony.
Tony’s mother and father both do not speak English so working with Jeff has had a major impact on his education.
“It took a while for me to see that light spark in Tony. I was concerned I was not having an impact on him, but his teacher encouraged me to keep trying. One day, I saw that light spark in him and I realized he actually was catching on”, Jeff said. T
he most rewarding part of this experience for Jeff is seeing the light spark in students over the process of their one-to-one experience.
Jeff also spoke about seeing former students and their interaction after the year ends. He spoke about a student he coached in the past who was a little more challenging and took a little more time to catch on. The following year Jeff saw the student in the cafeteria one morning during breakfast. The student ran up to Jeff and had a conversation with him.
Toward the end of the conversation the student said, “I wish we were working together again this year.” This touched Jeff that he impacted the student.
Jeff encourages his golf buddies and anyone he comes in contact with looking for volunteer opportunities to get involved with the One-to-One program.
“I think this experience benefits me just as much as it benefits the students”, Jeff said.
Registration is open for the One to One: Practicing Reading and Math with Students program. For more information or to sign up for one of our trainings, please visit the website or contact Leslie Armstrong at (859) 282-9214.
This story is one of a series on One To One coaching in cooperation with the Northern Kentucky Education Council.
