A new collaboration will provide youth in Chicago’s South Side the opportunity to get tutoring through a new perspective while becoming immersed with philosophy, all with the support and participation from their parents and adults in the community. The program is a collaboration between the Illinois Humanities Council’s Odyssey Project, the Black Star Project and the University of Chicago’s Civic Knowledge Project.
AKArama U will be the name for a new project offering free, once-a-week tutoring sessions for youth in math, writing, reading, along with an introduction to the philosophies. The program, open to youth from 5th to 8th grade, will provide small group instruction in reading, writing, and math by tutors from the Black Star Project. As a specialty subject, students from the University of Chicago’s Civic Knowledge Project will introduce youth to philosophy through practice of philosophical dialogue, the Socratic method, and public speaking, dramatic performance, and other verbal arts drawn from the humanities.
There will also be an Adult Writing Center open for adults in conjunction with the classes, managed by the Illinois Humanities Council’s Odyssey Project, giving parents and other interested community members a chance to engage with and support the youth participants.
AKArama U will take place Saturdays, 2:00 pm until 5:00 pm beginning January 12 to March 16, 2013, and will take place at AKArama Community Services Center (6220 S. Ingleside Avenue, Chicago, 60637). Classes are free, although registration is required. To register, contact Jami Becka at the Black Star Youth Project at 773-285-9600, or jami@blackstarproject.org. For more information about the Adult Writing Center, contact Amy Thomas Elder, director of The Odyssey Project at 312-422-5580 or amy@prairie.org.
