What We Do
We are based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa at nine high poverty schools in the Cedar Rapids Community School District: Grant, Harrison, Hoover, Cedar River Academy at Taylor, and Van Buren Elementary Schools, Roosevelt Creative Corridor Business Academy and Wilson Middle School and Jefferson and Kennedy High Schools.
Kids on Course provides tutoring, enrichment, parent engagement, summer learning and long-term mentoring. Our program begins with students in elementary schools and follows them throughout their educational career.
TUTORING
Provides academic support and resources to teachers, parents, and students to ensure a clear path to graduating from high school and post-secondary education.
FAMILY ENGAGEMENT
Provide an avenue through which families can be positively connected to school and the community and engaged in their student’s learning.
ENRICHMENT
Collaborate with artists, athletes and creatives to improve students’ self-efficacy, resiliency, academic achievement and engagement in school.
NAVIGATE BARRIERS
Connect schools and families to community resources to ensure that students are physically, socially, and emotionally ready to learn.
Why Education?
Kids who are behind in 4th grade in reading are four times more likely to drop out of high school and 13 times more likely to not graduate from high school on time. Kids who drop out of high school are ineligible for 90% of jobs in America.
They are also twice as likely to abuse drugs, five times more likely to be involved in gangs and five times more likely to go to prison. Students attending the Kids on Course year-round program are six times more likely to be on grade level in reading compared to peers not in the program. Education is the ticket to breaking the cycle of poverty and having a life of opportunity.