Northeast high schoolers create free online tutoring service

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- Molly McCaffery, a junior at Arts Academy at Benjamin Rush has now gotten into a groove learning from her dining room on Zoom eight hours a day.

"Personally I really struggled with getting adjusted to virtual learning," said McCaffery. "Of course I recognized its benefits in all during this time, but I really benefit from getting that auditory learning."

Molly and her best friend Chantelle Faria, a junior at Archbishop Ryan put their heads together and realized that many of their peers were struggling with virtual school. While Chantelle is now back in school, the two created Youth Enlightened, a free online tutoring service.

"At this point, everyone is struggling," said Faria. "This curriculum right now is very different from what we were doing in the spring and everyone's just getting adjusted to this."

"I have three younger siblings and I saw how much they struggled," said McCaffery. "Being younger and I wanted to see how we could help specifically younger students."

Their efforts speaks to what's become a major concern for parents- a report released last year by the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado Boulders, on average, 50.1% of virtual high school students graduate within four years, compared with 84% of high school students nationally.

Molly and Chantelle got their friends involved with this great idea. Both founders previously were peer tutors.

The service launched in early September and already, they've seen success.

"I was tutoring a student for the past few days and today she had a test on that subject and she got a very good grade," Faria said.