GE Grant Programs

The three GE Grants have supported and financed more than 11 programs to this point. The goal of all three grants and all of the programs is to help our freshmen successfully complete their freshman year, graduate in 4 years, and enter post-secondary education. These programs include:

GE Tutoring/Mentoring - Every Tuesday and Thursday after school GE volunteers come to the SHS media center to tutor/mentor our students wanting help with homework, a difficult subject, or preparation for the Exit Exam.

Faculty Mentors - Each freshman attending the Transition Class and/or the Freshman Camp will be assigned a faculty mentor whom they can turn to for advise about school issues/concerns and who will meet with them periodically to check on their academic progress.

Southside's first Summer Transition Course for incoming Freshmen took place for 3 weeks in June. The course included sessions in math, 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens, and our new Read180 lab. End of course evaluations by students were very positive about what they had learned and the benefits of continuing the program.

Our August 1-day seminars for Upperclassmen this year provided schedules, locks and lockers, workshops for the SAT and Exit Exams, class pictures, and a College and Career Fair. 16 colleges and 4 businesses participated in the fairs.

The second week in August we held our 4-day Freshman Camp. We offered sessions such as An Introduction to Southside, Goal Setting, Graphing Calculators, Critical Thinking, Geometry, Schedules, lockers and organizations, Details and Inference, College Expectations, a career interest survey, class pictures, and Robotics.

To address the low reading skills of many students, Southside purchased licenses for 60 students and created a new READ180 lab. English I and Reading will be double-blocked for those students. The class is very structured with time allotted for whole group instruction, individual reading, computer-based instruction, small group instruction, and whole group wrap-up. We purchased 60 licenses for the first year, and when significant gains are verified, we plan to purchase an additional 60 so that these students may continue the process as sophomores and a new group of freshmen can begin the process.

Beginning November 1, Southside's second reading lab will be operating. This is the Fast ForWord lab which is based on brain-research and training students to differentiate between sounds that they currently cannot distinguish.