Charlie Covit (no pun intended), an 11th grader at the Heschel High School in New York and the Chief Operating Officer of “Adopt a Neighbor,” wrote us about his venture, and we were impressed:
Adopt a Neighbor is an international youth led program serving children in Jewish communities with free virtual tutoring and summer activities. We have already offered free tutoring services from high school students to nearly 150 Jewish children. In the summer, we will transition to focusing largely on free and fun virtual summer activities, such as cooking, fitness, and coding classes, to help keep children occupied while school is out of session. To aid our effort to serve as many Jewish families as possible and further expand our reach, we would like to ask if the Jewish Press could help publicize our initiative.
Adopt a Neighbor has a simple mission, which is to assist Jewish communities with their educational needs while children stay home from school. Adopt a Neighbor matches highly capable high school students who have previous tutoring experience with children seeking some extra help. We create matches based on our tutors’ area of expertise and the students’ needs, and our tutors create a personalized schedule and curriculum for each student. This can include helping the student with their homework, growing their confidence in any general studies or Judaic subject through extra practice, or assisting them with reading. We are proud to say that we have expanded to over ten states and five countries. Parents have expressed immense gratitude to our tutors for helping their children academically during this difficult time. During the summer, Adopt a Neighbor will offer a wide range of virtual programming for children, including cooking, fitness, art, Talmud, sign language classes and more.
Their website, Adopt a Neighbor, offers testimonials from satisfied parents, such as Lauren Levy, who wrote: “My son who is in 2nd grade was very excited to work with his tutor, Charlie Covit. Anytime Charlie was free during his own school day, he would always make time for Ronny. He helped Ronny understand his Ivrit and math homework. My daughter who is in 3rd grade also had the opportunity to work with a very devoted tutor, Tzivia Deitsch. Together, stress-free, they would always complete the homework assignments. I would recommend the program to any family!! Such a wonderful thing!! Thank you!!”
And parent Arielle Maccabi wrote: “When I first heard about the adopt a neighbor program I was so excited to give it a try. Thank g-d they paired up both my son and daughter with amazing special tutors. We are so grateful for this wonderful program!!”
Adopt a Neighbor is a project of the 501(c)3 non-profit organization Me’ver, which is sponsored in turn by the Moise Safra Center. Call them at 917-842-3829 or [email protected] with your questions.
Adopt a Neighbor was founded and cultivated by Jonah Elzweig and David Berger.