Three out of every four students involved in Give Every Child a Chance programs show at least a year’s growth in language arts comprehension.

Gains in the grasp of math is almost as high with 63 percent of the GECAC students advancing a year or more of growth after being enrolled in the free non-profit tutoring programs.

Overall 81 percent of every child receiving help through one-on-one tutoring or group tutoring showed academic improvement.

An independent report conducted by the San Joaquin Community Data Cooperative that includes checking state test scores shows that on the 15th anniversary of GECAC the organization is achieving its goal of improving the comprehension of struggling students enough so that when they graduate from the program they are more engaged and enthused about learning.

GECAC has also been lauded by education officials both in Sacramento and Washington, D.C., for being among the most effective in the nation in terms of both results and cost.

“Sometimes it takes just knowing someone else cares,” said Carol Davis, GECAC chief executive officer of how struggling students turn around in the program.

Davis added that some students often learn differently than others. To effectively reach such students is tough on a teacher in classroom with a cross-section of abilities.

GECAC relies on input from teachers to determine what help a student needs. Volunteers receive training and are then matched based on what they are comfortable with such as teaching math to high school students or mentoring young children in language arts.

Manteca Unified School District monitors the progress via changes in state test scores of students recommended for GECAC. The bottom line has been students who were previously struggling and not participating in classroom discussions and up making significant gains in mastering academics plus become more engaged in the classroom.

The program that started with 13 students and three tutors at two sites in 1998 has grown to the point they served 4,860 students last year with the help of 540 volunteers at 51 locations.

The organization has a $2 million annual budget with government accounting for just fewer than 90 percent of its revenue. The next largest chunk is investment revenue that came to $161,566 from money the late Antoine Raymus set aside. Raymus started GECAC with $300,000 out of his pocket.

GECAC currently has a pressing need for more tutors for its core one-on-one tutoring program.

Volunteers can be as young as fifth graders. They just need to be able to mentor/tutor a student for an hour a day twice a week.

After training, volunteers are matched with students based on the time they have available as well as the subject and age level they are comfortable with.

GECAC now has a waiting list of 400 students who need to be paired with tutors.

For more information on volunteering go to www.gecac.net or call Jamie Dadasovich at 825-7003.