For Immediate Release
Oct 30, 2007 4:24 PM
The New York Public Library, Brooklyn Public Library, Queens Library and the union representing New York City’s public school educators have formed a partnership to link the union’s telephone homework help service and the libraries’ homework Web site to offer students, parents and guardians greater access to library resources and skilled educators to help answer their research questions.
HomeworkNYC.org, a Web site maintained by the city’s three library systems in partnership with the city Department of Education that offers access to library resources online, is now linked to Dial-A-Teacher, a telephone hotline created by the United Federation of Teachers and staffed by more than four dozen veteran educators offering homework help in English, Spanish, Chinese, French, Haitian-Creole, Italian, Greek and Hebrew.
As a result of the partnership, students using computers to access the library via the Internet can click a link that directs them to Dial-A-Teacher, which runs Monday through Thursday from 4 to 7 p.m. during the school year. In addition to being directed to Dial-A-Teacher’s phone number – 212-777-3380 – students soon will be able to access an online chat room where they can interact with Dial-A-Teacher staff. The Dial-A-Teacher staff also can direct students who call needing research sources to the library Web site.
“This partnership between us is a great move for both programs and a real win for the students and parents that come to us for help with homework,” said UFT President Randi Weingarten. “As educators devoted to helping students succeed, we are thrilled to have this opportunity to broaden our reach and work with one of the most distinguished institutions in this country,” she said.
“The New York Public Library is deeply committed to education and has strong ties to our neighborhood schools,” said Library President Paul LeClerc. “Live homework assistance is one of the most popular services offered on our HomeworkNYC.org Web site, and we’re pleased that the Dial-A-Teacher telephone hotline is now available to New York City’s students and parents that visit the site,” he continued, adding, “Whether HomeworkNYC.org is accessed from the Library or from a family’s home computer, this is another way we work with teachers to provide invaluable resources to students.”
Dial-A-Teacher, sponsored jointly by the UFT and the Department of Education, began operation 27 years ago as the first service of its kind in the nation offering live one-on-one homework help from veteran educators. As it has grown in scope over the years it has handled almost two million calls and has served as the model for similar programs across the country.
The HomeworkNYC.org Web site was created in 2005 by the New York Public Library in collaboration with the Brooklyn Public Library and Queens Library with a grant from the Wallace Foundation, as part of its Learning in Libraries initiative, with additional support from HSBC in the Community (USA), Inc. It brings together in a single site all of the resources that kindergartners through 12th-graders need to help themselves with their school assignments, and it offers live one-on-one help by telephone or online from librarians, teachers and professional tutors along with information provided by Answers.com. It also offers study guides and many other free services.