It was a Saturday morning, but class was in session at Vicksburg Intermediate.

The school held the first of four weekend tutoring installments for students — to help them improve their state standardized test scores, as well as make strides in their math, reading and language skills.

The sessions are for any child at the school, good grades or not, who wants to learn and excel, organizers said.

“It was the teachers’ idea,” principal Sharon Williams said Saturday.

About three dozen of those instructors and members of the community have volunteered to tutor for three more Saturday mornings — April 9 and 30 and May 7 — in preparation for the Mississippi Curriculum Tests, which are given to students in the third through eighth grades.

The teachers will not be paid for the extra three hours per Saturday. The MCT2 exams will be administered May 10-12, and make-up tests will be given May 13.

The sessions will focus on reading, math and language arts, plus other academic areas.

“MCT is important, but the main thing is preparing the students for future learning,” Williams said. “MTC is one snapshot of what you have to do, and we want them to be successful.”