A $100,000 grant is allowing UA mentors to reach more children living in at-risk situations through the College of Education's SOAR program.

"Soar like an eagle, that's what we want those young people to do," said Paul Sypherd, provost of Academic Affairs, during a luncheon held Friday. Approximately 25 people attended.

The grant given to the Student Opportunity for Academic Renewal, or SOAR, program is funded by the Coca-Cola Foundation through the Career Corridor Initiative. The program will receive $100,000 for the following three years.

SOAR is a mentoring program that pairs UA students from the College of Education with at-risk children from the Tucson Unified School District.

It is part of an early intervention program that offers students academic and personal mentoring.

"This is a homegrown project. It started without any funding. It started with a wish, a dream," said George Garcia, TUSD superintendent, at the luncheon.

Regina Serrano, director of multicultural recruitment and retention, and Glenn Howell, liaison specialist for the TUSD violence prevention unit, are credited with starting the community mentoring program.

When Project SOAR began in spring of 1994, mentors worked with 15 students. Mentors now help more than 50 eighth-graders from Doolen, Mansfeld and Wakefield middle schools. With the grant, the project will expand to 120 students.

Serrano said freshmen from Tucson High Magnet, Catalina and Pueblo high schools will now be participating in the SOAR program because of the added funding.

Serrano said the TUSD schools were chosen based on crime statistics and the number of ethnicities in the area.

During the luncheon, Garcia also spoke about the positive impact mentors have had on eighth graders.

Garcia said the attendance of children has increased dramatically because they are getting attention from their peers. Suspensions have decreased and students have improved their academic performances because of the mentors' guidance, he said.

"We have to give back to our community. They need us so much," said Marco Antonio Ruiz, bilingual elementary education junior.

Ruiz supervises 15 to 18 student mentors who work at Doolen Middle School. Ruiz helped mentor an eighth grader at Doolen. He said the student is passing his drug test after receiving guidance.

Patrick, also an eighth grader at Doolen, has traded his failing grades for a C average, Ruiz said. Patrick's attendance is also 100 percent better because of the mentoring program.

Michael Bivens, education director of the Coca-Cola Foundation, said it was because of Project SOAR's success that the UA was chosen as one of four universities in the nation to join the Career Corridor Initiative.

CCI is a national education initiative supported by the Foundation. It is a program that creates partnerships between public schools and universities to provide continuous learning and career development opportunities for students.

Bivens said Coca-Cola Co. invested $50 million in 1990 because it was prepared to support excellence in education. And based on that commitment, he said, the Coca-Cola Foundation was looking for programs that were successful.

He said the UA was chosen because the College of Education has a program that works and it is helping to keep children in school. But most importantly, he said, the UA was chosen because the university has a collaborative relationship with the school syst em (TUSD).

Garcia said the grant will provide money for the training of mentors, more activities for students, and added staff to keep records and scheduling issues.