The public was urged by a social welfare group to help improve the lives of disadvantaged children by volunteering for an after-school tutoring program.
The program, launched in 2006 to assist poor children learn reading and social skills, is suffering from a shortage of teachers, said the Eden Social Welfare Foundation, which runs the program.
The lack of staff and difficulty in recruiting have led to existing tutors being overworked, said foundation chief executive Huang Cho-sung (黃琢嵩), who said that if the situation worsened, the quality of the education and care on offer might be compromised.
Although the foundation has about 100 tutors nationwide, demand is much higher in 39 rural communities, where fewer volunteers are available.
According to a survey carried out by the foundation in August, each tutor works an average of 35 hours a week and looks after 15 or more students each day.
The free service offers children a place to go after school so that they are not reduced to wandering the streets, Huang said.
While calling for more volunteers to get involved in the program, the foundation stressed the need for younger tutors, saying that most of the existing tutors are retired people who have trouble keeping up with active children.
About 1,800 volunteer teachers are needed to relieve the staff shortage, the foundation said.
“What we do is not just teaching. We spend a lot of time doing individual counseling and helping to prevent family crises,” said Kuo Hsiu-yun (郭秀雲), a tutor from a village in the suburbs of GreaterTainan.
Keeping the program running is important for Kuo’s community because most of the children there are from low-income families and/or living with grandparents who do not have the energy or knowledge to teach them.
“In fact, we don’t care so much about their academic performance,” she said. “We just don’t want to see our next generation going astray.”
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