After an eerily quiet week at Cristo Rey, the building finally feels like a school again now that around twenty students come in each morning for summer school. Now I get to spend every morning assisting in the classroom as students complete online course recovery and develop foundational reading and math skills. A whole team of teachers and myself coordinate summer school, and it is through working with them that I am learning more about the many hats one wears to ensure the school runs smoothly.

Depending on which student raises their hand for help, I become Ms. Webb, the geometry tutor, fluent Spanish speaker, or theology expert. I often know very little about the subjects they are working on–the geometry questions always stump me–but I realized that my role in summer school is more about being the students’ personal cheerleader, rather than their teacher. The faculty assisting with summer school are here to make lesson plans and use their expertise to develop math and reading skills, while I have the job of encouraging the students along the way. When a student raises their hand with a question, I have the opportunity to sit with them and allow them to talk through their thinking with me. Usually, I don’t have to provide much help because the student is on the right track to mastering a concept. The students have the agency within themselves to answer the questions, and nothing is more exciting than watching them realize that too as they come up to me and say, “Ms. Webb I did it on my own… and passed!”

Along with watching students succeed academically, another highlight of working with the students comes whenever I see them goofing around and acting like normal teenagers. When they think none of the teachers are watching, students will ~hit the woah~ across the room to each other or try to get away with watching a Youtube video instead of doing their work. I always laugh because it reminds me that I am only a few years older than the high schoolers; their “secret” ways of getting to joke with their friends across the room parallel how my friends and I act whenever we end up in a course together at OSU.

Initially, I was really nervous about working with students in summer school, but the first week alone has been incredibly rewarding. Interacting with students and assisting with their coursework has brought a new energy to the work that I do. Whether I am wearing the hat of lunch monitor, development intern, or personal student cheerleader, I am part of the Cristo Rey team. The work I am doing–no matter if it is in the classroom or in my little office–will ultimately further Cristo Rey’s mission of transforming educational outcomes for Columbus students.