San Francisco, March 2007 Salesforce.com is the first company in San Francisco joining an exciting new pilot tutoring program by partnering with education nonprofit Innovations for Learning and the Jewish Coalition for Literacy. Innovations for Learning has developed software designed to allow volunteers to tutor students online, from the ease of their office desk! This software is a fantastic tool, allowing busy employees, who normally may not have had time to tutor at all, reach children who are struggling with literacy. In February, eight Salesforce.com tutors were paired with first grade students at El Dorado Elementary in Visitacion Valley. First, the tutors met their students at a "meet and greet" at the school, where they shared snacks and books which the kids were able to take home.

Now, from their offices or wherever they have computer access, these tutors will "call" their

tutees' classrooms once a week. The students "answer" from their classroom, using computers and headphones. Then, using Innovations for Learning software, the tutors take their students through a half-hour tutoring session using illustrated texts and literacy games. David Coffman, Senior Revenue Recognition Analyst and lead volunteer with the program, describes his tutoring sessions: "Terence, the first grader I tutoring through WebEx each week is always so excited when we start our session. He easily remembers the stories we read and games we played from last week and loves to beat me at Tic Tac Toe. Last week, when his classmates left the room for lunch he chose to stay to finish the story we were reading." He went on to say "30 minutes a week is so easy to fit into my schedule that I was even able to make my session that was scheduled during month-end close."

 

The program achieves several important goals: disadvantaged school children are connected with role models and their literacy skills are improved by bringing cutting-edge technology into elementary school classrooms. The company will look to expand its involvement into more classrooms in the fall.

This is just another way that salesforce.com shows its dedication to literacy programs in the public schools. The company also has been involved with a program called I'm All Ears with Jean Parker Elementary since 2002. Each Wednesday, volunteers from salesforce.com visit the school and have students read to them one-on-one. This partnership and program has been an incredible success, and has expanded to include student visits to the salesforce.com office-one of which took place on March 14!