Conexiones Expansion

Capstone Project
Chance McCutcheon
My Service Experience

When I started volunteering with Conexiones,

the program was only doing in-home visits to
Spanish-speaking households to help the children
with their homework and reading in English. I
now have the opportunity to serve teaching
English classes each week and overseeing this
new program expansion. Through this experience,
I’ve realized that so many people are wanting to
serve but are just waiting for an opportunity to
be placed in front of them. I’ve also learned that
there are more and more families in need of the
resources that we as BYU students can provide.
The Issues

1. There are always more BYU volunteers interested in serving

than families available to be visited.
2. Several volunteers lack the means of transportation in order to
do in-home visits.
3. Difficulty verifying addresses, phone numbers, and scheduling
with the families being visited.
4. Volunteers are sometimes uncomfortable visiting strangers in
their home.
Why I Chose to Improve These Issues:

Currently there are many students wanting to volunteer and serve with their
ability to speak Spanish, but have not been able to have that opportunity
through Conexiones due to the shortage of families available to visit. There
are also volunteers who don’t feel comfortable visiting the homes of people
they do not know personally. By providing a more public extension of the
program at nearby schools and on BYU campus, this project will provide a
long-term solution to all of these issues. Although there might be other
ways to solve these problems, this project provides an efficient and
sustainable solution that can address all of the issues at hand.
 Conexiones started out as a program for
BYU students to make in-home visits to
Spanish-speaking households and help the
children with their homework and reading in
English. The idea of this project is to take
the program to a more public level and
offer this same form of tutoring for

The Project Spanish-speaking students in middle schools

and elementary schools in the Provo/Orem
(Conexiones Expansion) area. This in-school tutoring will be in
addition to the current expansion that has
taken place offering English classes on BYU
campus. Through this expansion, the
program will offer volunteers the
opportunity to serve either in homes, on
BYU campus, or at nearby public schools.
The Contribution Conexiones has now expanded to partner
with Provo Peaks Elementary school to
offer tutoring to English Language Learning
(ELL) Spanish-speaking students who are
struggling in school. This includes general
tutoring for ELL students and, more
specifically, 6th grade math tutoring for
ELL students. This program expansion also
includes teaching Spanish to English
speaking elementary students on Fridays
during the Provo Peaks Elementary School’s
Spanish club. The other contribution in this
partnership will be using our core program
of in-home visits to help ELL students upon
referrals from the school.
 Conexiones started out as a program for
students to make in-home visits to Spanish
speaking households and help the children
with their homework and reading in English.
The idea of this project is to take the
program to a more public level and offer
this same form of tutoring for Spanish

The Organizations
speaking students in middle schools and
elementary schools in the Provo/Orem area.

(Conexiones and Provo Peaks Provo Peaks Elementary School is a public

Elementary School) elementary school just a few blocks south

of BYU campus. Several teachers have
expressed a desire for BYU volunteers to
help their students struggling with English
find more success in their classes. We
worked specifically with their ELL program.
 The Benefit
The best part about service is that, almost always, both the people providing and
the people receiving the service benefit from it. This project has benefited
Conexiones volunteers by greatly increasing and diversifying the opportunities to
serve within the program. At the same time, ELL students and teachers are
receiving the help and resources from BYU volunteers that will hopefully provide
greater long-term academic success. An added benefit is that Conexiones will
also receive more family referrals for in-home visits thus expanding our existing
program as well and meeting more needs by reaching more families. Seeing the
excitement of the Conexiones volunteers to participate in this program and
considering the impact they could have in the future of so many young children’s
lives is a major success, especially considering almost none of these children
would have received this additional help and support otherwise.